Half a King

ONE FAMILY

The South Wind listed in its dock, looking like anything but a warm breeze.

Compared to the swift, slender ships of Gettland it was a wallowing monster, low to the water and fat at the waist, green weed and barnacle coating its ill-tended timbers, with two stubby masts and two dozen great oars on a side, slit-windowed castles hunched at blunt prow and stern.

‘Welcome home,’ said Trigg, shoving Yarvi between a pair of frowning guards and towards the gangplank.

A dark-skinned young woman sat on the roof of the aftcastle, one leg swinging as she watched the new slaves shuffle across. ‘This the best you could do?’ she asked with scarcely the hint of an accent, and sprang easily down. She had a thrall-collar of her own, but made from twisted wire, and her chain was loose and light, part coiled about her arm as though it was an ornament she had chosen to wear. A slave even more favoured than Ankran, then.

She checked in the mouth of the coughing Vansterman and clicked her tongue, poked at the Shend’s crooked back and blew out her cheeks in disgust. ‘The captain won’t think much of these slops.’

‘And where is our illustrious leader?’ Ankran had the air of already knowing the answer.

‘Asleep.’

‘Asleep drunk?’

She considered that, mouth moving faintly as though she was working at a sum. ‘Not sober.’

‘You worry about the course, Sumael,’ grunted Trigg, shoving Yarvi’s companions on again. ‘The rowers are my business.’

Sumael narrowed her dark eyes at Yarvi as he shuffled past. She had a scar and a notch in her top lip where a little triangle of white tooth showed, and he found himself wondering what southern land she was born in and how she had come here, whether she was older or younger than him, hard to tell with her hair chopped short—

She darted out a quick arm and caught his wrist, twisting it up so his hand came free of his torn sleeve.

‘This one has a crippled hand.’ No mockery, merely a statement of fact, as though she had found a lame cow in a herd. ‘There’s only one finger on it.’ Yarvi tried to pull free but she was stronger than she looked. ‘And that seems a poor one.’

‘That damn flesh-dealer!’ Ankran elbowed past to grab Yarvi’s wrist and twist it about to look. ‘You said you could row!’

Yarvi could only shrug and mutter, ‘I didn’t say well.’

‘It’s almost as if you can’t trust anyone,’ said Sumael, one black eyebrow high. ‘How will he row with one hand?’

‘He’ll have to find a way,’ said Trigg, stepping up to her. ‘We’ve got nine spaces and nine slaves.’ He loomed over Sumael and spoke with his blunt nose no more than a finger’s width from her pointed one. ‘Unless you fancy a turn on the benches?’

She licked at that notch in her lip, and eased carefully backward. ‘I’ll worry about the course, shall I?’

‘Good idea. Chain the cripple on Jaud’s oar.’

They dragged Yarvi along a raised gangway down the middle of the deck, past benches on either side, three men to each huge oar, all shaven-headed, all lean, all collared, watching him with their own mixtures of pity, self-pity, boredom and contempt.

A man was hunched on hands and knees, scrubbing at the deck-boards, face hidden by a shag of matted hair and colourless beard, so beggarly he made the most wretched of the oarsmen look like princes. One of the guards aimed the sort of careless kick at him you might at a stray dog and sent him crawling away, dragging a great weight of heavy chain after him. The ship did not seem well supplied in general but of chain there was no shortage.

They flung Yarvi down with unnecessary violence between two other slaves, by no means an encouraging pair. At the end of the oar was a hulking southerner with a thick fold of muscle where his neck should have been, head tipped back so he could watch the sea-birds circling. Closest to the rowlock was a dour old man, short and stocky, his sinewy forearms thick with grey hair, his cheeks full of broken veins from a life in the weather, picking at the calluses on his broad palms.

‘Gods damn it,’ grunted this older one, shaking his head as the guards chained Yarvi to the bench beside him, ‘we’ve a cripple at our oar.’

‘You prayed for help, didn’t you?’ said the southerner, without looking around. ‘Here is help.’

‘I prayed for help with two hands.’

‘Be thankful for half of what you prayed for,’ said Yarvi. ‘Believe me, I prayed for none of this.’

The big man’s mouth curled up a little as he looked at Yarvi sidelong. ‘When you have a load to lift, you’re better lifting than weeping. I am Jaud. Your sour oarmate is Rulf.’

‘My name’s Yorv,’ said Yarvi, having turned his story over in advance. Keep your lies as carefully as your winter grain, Mother Gundring would have said. ‘I was a cook’s boy—’

With a practised roll of the tongue and twitch of the head the old man spat over the ship’s side. ‘You’re nothing now, and that’s all. Forget everything but the next stroke. That makes it a little easier.’

Jaud heaved up a sigh. ‘Don’t let Rulf grind the laughter out of you. He’s sour as lemons, but a good man to have at your back.’ He puffed out his cheeks. ‘Though, one must admit, since he’s chained to your side, that will never happen.’

Yarvi gave a sorry little chuckle, maybe his first since he was made a slave. Maybe his first since he was made a king. But he didn’t laugh long.

The door of the aftcastle banged wide and a woman swaggered into the light, raised both arms with a flourish and shrieked, ‘I am awake!’

She was very tall, sharp-featured as a hawk with a pale scar across one dark cheek and her hair pinned up in a tangle. Her clothes were a gaudy patchwork of a dozen cultures’ most impractical attire – a silken shirt with frayed embroidery flapping at the sleeves, a silvery fur coat ruffled by the breeze, a fingerless glove on one hand and the other crusted with rings, a crystal-studded belt the gilt end of which flapped about the grip of a curved sword slung absurdly low.

She kicked aside the nearest oarsman so she could prop one sharp-toed boot on his bench and grinned down the ship, gold glinting among her teeth.

Right away the slaves, the guards, the sailors began to clap. The only ones who did not join them were Sumael, her tongue wedged in her cheek on the roof of the aftcastle, the beggar whose scrubbing block was still scrape-scraping on the gangway, and Yarvi, ex-King of Gettland.

‘Damn this bitch,’ Rulf forced through a fixed grin while he applauded.

‘You’d better clap,’ murmured Jaud.

Yarvi held up his hands. ‘I’m worse equipped for that than rowing.’

‘Little ones, little ones!’ called the woman, ring-covered fist pressed to her chest with emotion, ‘you do me too much honour! Don’t let that stop you trying, though. To those who have recently joined us, I am Ebdel Aric Shadikshirram, your captain and care-giver. You may well have heard of me, for my name is famous throughout the Shattered Sea and far beyond, yea unto the very walls of the First of Cities and so on.’

Her fame had not reached Yarvi, but Mother Gundring always used to say the wise speaker learns first when to stay silent.

‘I could regale you with rousing tales of my colourful past,’ she went on, toying with an earring of gold and feathers that dangled down well past her shoulder. ‘How I commanded the victorious fleet of the empress at the Battle of Fulku, was for some time a favoured lover of Duke Mikedas himself but refused to become his wife, scattered the blockade at Inchim, sailed through the greatest tempest since the Breaking of God, landed a whale, and blah blah blah, but why?’ She affectionately patted the cheek of the nearest slave, hard enough for the slapping to be clearly heard. ‘Let us simply say this ship is now the world to you, and on this ship I am great and you are lowly.’

‘We’re great,’ echoed Trigg, sweeping the benches with his frown, ‘you’re lowly.’

‘Fine profits today, in spite of the sad need to replace a few of your brethren.’ The many buckles on the captain’s boots jingled as she swaggered between the benches. ‘You will all have a mouthful of bread and wine tonight.’ Scattered cheers at this spectacular show of generosity. ‘Though you belong to me—’

Trigg noisily cleared his throat.

‘—and the other shareholders in our brave vessel—’

Trigg nodded cautious approval.

‘—still I like to think of us all as one family!’ The captain gathered the whole ship in her outstretched arms, huge sleeves streaming in the breeze as though she were some rare and enormous sea-bird taking flight. ‘I, the indulgent grandparent, Trigg and his guards the kindly uncles, you the troublesome brood. United against merciless Mother Sea, ever the sailor’s most bitter enemy! You are lucky little children, for mercy, charity and kindness have always been my great weaknesses.’ Rulf hawked up phlegm in disgust at that. ‘Most of you will see the good sense in being obedient offspring, but … perhaps …’ and Shadikshirram’s smile collapsed to leave her dark face a caricature of hurt, ‘there is some malcontent among you thinking of going their own way.’

Trigg gave a disapproving growl.

‘Of turning his back upon his loving family. Of abandoning his brothers and sisters. Of leaving our loyal fellowship at some harbour or other.’ The captain traced the fine scar down her cheek with one fingertip and bared her teeth. ‘Perhaps even of raising a treacherous hand against his doting carers.’

Trigg gave a horrified hiss.

‘Should some devil send such thoughts your way …’ The captain leaned down towards the deck. ‘Think on the last man to try it.’ She came up with the heavy chain and gave it a savage tug, jerking the filthy deck-scrubber from his feet and squawking over in a tangle of limbs, rags, hair. ‘Never let this ungrateful creature near a blade!’ She stepped onto him where he lay. ‘Not an eating knife, not a nail-trimmer, not a fish-hook!’ She walked over him, tall heels grinding into his back, losing not the slightest poise in spite of the challenging terrain. ‘He is nothing, do you hear me?’

‘Damn this bitch,’ murmured Rulf again as she hopped lightly from the back of the beggar’s head.

Yarvi was watching the wretched scrubber as he clambered up, wiped blood from his mouth, retrieved his block, and without a sound crawled stiffly back to his work. Only his eyes showed through his matted hair for an instant as he looked towards the captain’s back, bright as stars.

‘Now!’ shouted Shadikshirram, swarming effortlessly up the ladder onto the roof of the aftcastle and pausing to twirl her ring-crusted fingers. ‘South to Thorlby, my little ones! Profits await! And Ankran?’

‘My captain,’ said Ankran, bowing so low he nearly grazed the deck.

‘Bring me some wine, all this blather has given me a thirst.’

‘You heard your grandma!’ roared Trigg, uncoiling his whip.

There were clatters and calls, the hissing of rope and the creaking of timbers as the few free sailors cast off and prepared the South Wind to leave Vulsgard’s harbour.

‘What now?’ muttered Yarvi.

Rulf gave a bitter hiss at such ignorance.

‘Now?’ Jaud spat into his palms and worked his two strong hands about the polished handles of their oar. ‘We row.’

HEAVE

Soon enough, Yarvi wished he had stayed in the flesh-dealer’s cellar.

‘Heave.’

Trigg’s boots ground out a ruthless rhythm as he prowled the gangway, whip coiled in meaty fists, eyes sweeping the benches for slaves in need of its encouragement, blunt voice booming out with pitiless regularity.

‘Heave.’

It was no surprise that Yarvi’s withered hand was even worse at gripping the handle of a great oar than it had been the handle of a shield. But Trigg made Master Hunnan seem a doting nursemaid in Yarvi’s memory. The whip was his first answer to any problem, but when that did not cause more fingers to sprout he lashed Yarvi’s crooked left wrist to the oar with chafing thongs.

‘Heave.’

With each impossible haul upon the handles of that terrible oar Yarvi’s arms and shoulders and back burned worse. Though the hides on the bench were worn to a silky softness, and the handles to a dull polish by his predecessors, with each stroke his arse was worse skinned, his hands worse blistered. With each stroke the whip cuts and the boot bruises and the slow-healing burns about his rough-forged thrall-collar were more stung by salt sea and salt sweat.

‘Heave.’

The suffering went far past any point of endurance Yarvi had imagined, but it was astonishing the inhuman efforts a whip in skilful hands could flick from a man. Soon its crack elsewhere, or even the approaching scrape of Trigg’s boots on the gangway, would make Yarvi flinch and whimper and pull that fraction harder, spit flecking from his gritted teeth.

‘This boy won’t last,’ growled Rulf.

‘One stroke at a time,’ murmured Jaud gently, his own strokes endlessly strong, smooth, regular, as though he was a man of wood and iron. ‘Breathe slow. Breathe with the oar. One at a time.’

Yarvi could not have said why, but that was some help.

‘Heave.’

And the rowlocks clattered and chains rattled, the ropes squealed and the timbers creaked, the oar-slaves groaned or cursed or prayed or kept grim silence, and the South Wind inched on.

‘One stroke at a time.’ Jaud’s soft voice was a thread through the haze of misery. ‘One at a time.’

Yarvi could hardly tell which was the worse torture – the whip’s stinging or his skin’s chafing or his muscles’ burning or the hunger or the weather or the cold or the squalor. And yet, the endless scraping of the nameless scrubber’s stone, up the deck and down the deck and up the deck again, his lank hair swaying and his scar-crossed back showing through his rags and his twitching lips curled from his yellowed teeth, reminded Yarvi that it could be worse.

It could always be worse.

‘Heave.’

Sometimes the gods would take pity on his wretched state and send a breath of favourable wind. Then Shadikshirram would smile her golden smile and, with the air of a long-suffering mother who could not help spoiling her thankless offspring, would order the oars unshipped and the clumsy sails of leather-banded wool unfurled, and would airily disclaim on how mercy was her greatest weakness.

With weeping gratitude Yarvi would slump back against the stilled oar of those behind and watch the sailcloth snap and billow overhead and breathe the close stink of more than a hundred sweating, desperate, suffering men.

‘When do we wash?’ Yarvi muttered, during one of these blissful lulls.

‘When Mother Sea takes it upon herself,’ growled Rulf.

That was not rarely. The icy waves that slapped the ship’s side would spot, spray, and regularly soak them to the skin, Mother Sea washing the deck and surging beneath the footrests until everything was crusted stiff with salt.

‘Heave.’

Each gang of three was chained together with one lock to their bench, and Trigg and the captain had the only keys. The oar-slaves ate their meagre rations chained to their bench each evening. They squatted over a battered bucket chained to their bench each morning. They slept chained to their bench, covered by stinking blankets and bald furs, the air heavy with moans and snores and grumbles and the smoke of breath. Once a week they sat chained to their bench while their heads and beards were roughly shaved – a defence against lice which deterred the tiny passengers not at all.

The only time Trigg reluctantly produced his key and opened one of those locks was when the coughing Vansterman was found dead one chill morning, and was dragged from between his blank-faced oarmates and heaved over the side.

The only one who remarked on his passing was Ankran, who plucked at his thin beard and said, ‘We’ll need a replacement.’

For a moment Yarvi worried the survivors might have to work that fraction harder. Then he hoped there might be a little more food to go around. Then he was sick at himself for the way he had started to think.

But not so sick he wouldn’t have taken the Vansterman’s share had it been offered.

‘Heave.’

He could not have said how many nights he passed limp and utterly spent, how many mornings he woke whimpering at the stiffness of the last day’s efforts only to be whipped to more, how many days without a thought but the next stroke. But finally an evening came when he did not sink straight into a dreamless sleep. When his muscles had started to harden, the first raw blisters had burst and the whip had fallen on him less.

The South Wind

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